ELEPHANTS 731 



picious. At length he pressed the button, which proved too 

 much for the nervous system of the tembos [SwahiU for ele- 

 phants]. With ears outspread and trunks curled up, and 

 screaming like locomotives they seemed spontaneously all to 

 charge straight for us. I knew my retreat, as I invariably 

 make a study of the ground immediately behind and to each 

 side of me when I go in to tackle elephants and I turned and 

 fled to the only tree within reasonable distance. This was 

 12 yards off. The other man bolted on and so did all 

 the niggers (6 of them). On reaching my tree (15 

 inches in diameter) I turned to face the charge and found 

 the 3 animals just topping the bank from which we had 

 been photographing (12 paces off). I picked out the 

 leader, the largest cow, and fired. This brought her up all 

 acheck [second mate's language*] but the others came and 

 jostled her and she, with them, started for me again. The 

 2d barrel killed her dead at 9 paces, and as I knew the 

 others would get me if I stayed, I bolted for the river 

 bed. The dead cow caused them to swerve and I escaped 

 them by a very narrow margin. It was the nearest call I 

 have had for quite some time with elephant. The other 

 man's 450 double jammed in the safety bolt and he never 

 fired but wisely kept on running like the niggers, through 

 the bush. The whole incident was all over in 20 to 25 

 seconds. 



"On the second occasion I was out with the same man on 

 the foothills of south Kenia and camping in the same small 

 open patch in the forest where you may remember I took 

 you to [near where Colonel Roosevelt killed his first ele- 



*He had served on whaling ships in the Arctic seas; and we used to com- 

 pare cow-punchers', lion hunters', elephant hunters', and whaling dialects. 



